The Atlas Obscura Podcast

Today the story of how a street lamp, a tangle with municipal government, and a love of the stars led a man to Goblin Valley, Utah a “dark sky certified” place for lovers of the night sky. READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/goblin-valley-state-park

Take a trip to a hostel in Iceland to visit the country’s last Big Mac, where the burger’s existence unfolds a story about economics and national identity. READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/iceland-mcdonalds

A river in the Amazon is so hot that anything that falls into it will die … but how did it get this way? Read more in the Atlas: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/the-boiling-river-of-the-amazon-puerto-inca-peru

This garden park in Paris, France contains the ruins of a colonial exhibition from 1907. READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/le-jardin-d-agronomie-tropicale

Thousands of years ago, a young woman named Ko-kwal-alwoot crouched over a set of tide pools, looked into the water, and saw a face looking back at her that wasn’t her own. Today, her descendants are still telling the story of what happened next. Read more in the Atlas: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/the-maiden-of-deception-pass Learn more about the Samish Indian Nation: https://www.samishtribe.nsn.us/

Scientists in Denver, Colorado store and conduct tests on miles of ice core samples dating back hundreds of thousands of years. READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/national-ice-core-lab

This underground oasis in Fresno, California is a winding maze of rooms and passageways filled with lush citrus trees. READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/forestiere-underground-gardens

A grand library in Portugal has some unexpected nighttime caretakers -- tiny bats. READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/mafra-palace-library-bats

Noah Purifoy was a pugilistic LA artist who eventually filled a 10 acre plot of land in Joshua Tree, CA with his of-kilter art. Noah Purifoy’s Outdoor Museum: http://www.noahpurifoy.com/joshua-tree-outdoor-museum Learn more about Dale Davis: https://dalebdavis.com/ Listen to our episode about Leimert Park: https://pod.link/1555769970/episode/1a593d4fba52c8d48fd9e62728a2a16f Listen to our episode about the Watts Towers Art Center:...

An underground chamber in Upton, MA puzzled some New Englanders while others long knew its ancient origins. READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/upton-chamber

Thousands of masks from the former Kingdom of Benin are spread throughout museums across the world. Is that where they belong?

Hashima Island in Japan was once the most densely populated place on Earth. Until – almost overnight – everyone left.

Typically, space junk ends up deep in the Pacific Ocean. This is the story of when it plunged back to earth … onto a street in small-town Wisconsin. Read more in the Atlas: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/sputnik-crash-site

This forest in Oslo, Norway will provide the trees for paper as part of a century long art project featuring famed contemporary authors. READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/forest-of-the-future-library

The Last Tenement in Boston’s old West End has come to represent everything that can go wrong with urban planning. READ MORE IN THE ATLAS:https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/the-last-tenement

These documents highlight the intellectual legacy of an ancient civilization based in Timbuktu, Mali. READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/timbuktu-manuscripts-mali

Writer and island-hopper Anna Marlis Burgard takes us on a tour of three of the 135 strange, incredible, and wondrous islands she’s explored in the United States. Learn more about Anna's Islands of America adventure: http://www.islandsofamerica.com/ Read more in the Atlas: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/the-united-islands-of-america CORRECTION: A previous version of this episode misidentified the name of the Skete on Nelson Island. It is the St. Nilus Skete, not the St. Nicholas...

We dig into the tales of TWO whales washing ashore along the southeastern coast of Brazil. And learn how one became a scientific marvel and the other, a local landmark. Read more in the Atlas: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/ubatuba-whale

This island between Missouri and Illinois was a preferred meeting place for duels to the death in the early 1900’s.

Famed Jazz musician Louis Armstrong’s house in Corona, Queens in New York is now a museum preserving his legacy. READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/louis-armstrong-house